My sister lives in the Los Angeles area, meaning that she is a short, direct flight away from Vancouver. As close as she is, I don’t get down there often enough. The reason isn’t a lack of interest. I like the region, and I like her, but I am hesitant to spend my limited vacation days to visit the US. And it’s not like it’s cheap for me to visit the United States. But this changed a little when we got a budget airline flying between YVR and LAX: Flair Airlines. The Ryan Air of North America. I think it is great for short trips; it’s super cheap provided you don’t need any extras. So I decided to go to southern California for 24 hours one weekend in April. Serious sister time and no vacation days used. Win. Win.
I asked my sister, Dawn, what she wanted to do, and she said she felt like driving to Palm Springs. It hadn’t even occurred to me that we could do this on such a short trip, but then I am someone who doesn’t drive. She does drive and assures me it would be no problem.
She picked me up at the airport at about 10:20am and we hit the road. Dawn, her dog Bear (a hearty whoodle), and me. It was a beautiful day as we zoomed out of the confines of Los Angeles and onto the desert. I was looking forward to Palm Springs, but even more, I was excited to make a stop at a quintessential California roadside attraction: The Cabazon Dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs!
Dawn and I are big Pee Wee Herman fans (I even have a Pee Wee Herman inspired tattoo) and if you have seen “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure” you know the Cabazon Dinosaurs. It’s where Pee Wee and the melancholy and wistful Simone go to talk before her crazy boyfriend shows up and chases Pee Wee around the dinosaurs. It is a real place, and you can visit it, just outside of LA.
In the 1960s, Claude Bell, a theme park artist and sculptor started creating a giant Brontosaurus. It was completed in 1975. It stands 45 feet tall and 150 feet long. A companion Tyrannosaurus Rex was completed in the 1980s. Bell died in 1988, but his legacy lives on.
You can stop and see these two giant dinos for free, but if you pay $15, you can go into small but fun dino park, where lots of other dinosaurs are on display. Admission also lets you climb int the T-Rex’s mouth. It was well worth the money, I say as a certified dinosaur dork. I took a ton of pictures and had a great time.
Our hearts full of joy, we carried on to Palm Springs.
Palm Springs
I had been curious about Palm Springs for a long time; not because I am a retired golfer, but because I love Frank Sinatra (another tattoo I have is of old blue eyes’ mug shot) and the Rat Pack era, and I have a fondness for mid-century design and architecture. It would have been nice to stay overnight, but this was a great intro.
Palm Springs just feels like it is from the 1950s. It has a smallish population of 44,000. Low slung buildings along a modest main street in front of a backdrop of dry rocky hills, dotted with cacti. No high rises. Lots of gorgeous mid-century houses. A design oasis. It is charming in a particular way that appeals to me.
Palm Springs has been settled for about 2000 years, due to the presence of hot springs in the desert, but it became trendy in the early 1900s when they started building small resorts and soon it was popular as a place for Hollywood types to have homes, including Sinatra, Bob Hope, and Bing Crosby. (I mean, who knows? Maybe it was trendy 2,000 years ago too.)
Other than visiting the art gallery and making a pilgrimage to Frank Sinatra’s house, I feel like I saw the city. It is small. A wander down the main street to pop into cute little shops and browse some of the excellent vintage and antique shops was a highlight. We had a good Mexican lunch and drove around ogling houses. I wouldn’t want to own one of these houses, but I would love to befriend someone who does. I can imagine smoking cigars by their backyard pools.
Speaking of cigars, there is a decent cigar shop, called “Fame” on the main drag and you can sit out front and have a cigar, but that is about it for smoking. Palm Springs is not a smoking friendly town.
I want to go back to Palm Springs and spend the night to do things I missed and take in a hike on one of the trails. But that would be for another time. We were headed west to Burbank.
Burbank and Heading Home
My sister moved from Hollywood to Burbank several years ago. Burbank gets made fun of a lot for being boring or whatever, but I kind of like it. It’s just a short drive to LA and it has a small city feel and, like Palm Springs, kind of feels like it is from another era.
We wandered downtown and had a bite to eat, taking in some street musicians before heading to bed. It was difficult to believe that I had only been in California for less than 12 hours.
The next morning, we got up around 4:30am (we’re both unstoppable morning people) and went for a walk, taking in the perfectly manicured residential streets and towering palms.
It was time to head back to the airport, but first a quick stop in Venice for breakfast and short walk on the beach. I was back in enough time to hang out at the airport lounge before boarding. I was back in Vancouver midday.
Santa Monica & Venice Beach
Do I wish I could have spent longer in California? Not really. It’s not going anywhere, and I like that I can go down again for an intense 24-hour sister visit. Plus, in about two weeks I would be off to Europe; Spain, Andorra, Lithuania, Latvia, and Sweden.
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